Speech test

Will went to the speech lab at the Cranofacial center yesterday. He liked the toys to play with while we waited in the room, but he did not like the tests. The first thing that Dr. Riski the director of the speech pathology lab did was to examine his mouth. The good news is that his palate is healed and appears to be long enough to make the speech sounds. The concern is that he still can't make the sounds he should be able to with his palate now closed, he also can't drink thru a straw or use a valve on a sippy cup. It is possible that pharynx is not in the correct place in his throat to deep and this may impact his speech. The second part of the test was by computer and it was interesting to see. Will didn't like the test because it uses a u shaped piece of metal with a microphone on both sides to pick up the sounds from the mouth and the amount of air escaping his nose. Mommy modeled it first and then Will tried it with the promise of getting something out of the treasure box.

We are working on the following sounds that involve pressure to make: p, b, t, d, k, g, s, sh. He can make the nasal sounds m, n ng (ring) and low pressure are okay: l, w, y,r, h. So we are back to asking him to hold his nose and whisper his sounds. Whispering sounds is hard because he loves to be loud. We go back in February to see if he is making progress.

Since he didn't have any testing that school based Speech language pathologist (SLP) use his school based SLP will evaluate him the next two weeks and then we will have his eligibility meeting and create a speech IEP for him.